ANTECEDENTS’ PHASE
Q. Have you found it easy to determine students’
3. THE ENGLISH FOR ESL LEARNERS SYLLABUS (AMENDED MARCH 2009) – SECTION 6, ASSESSMENT
Please comment on the following aspects of Section 6, Assessment, of the English for ESL Learners Amended Syllabus (March 2009) …
3.1 Suggested drafting strategy – 6.4.1 - Table 1 on page 26 of the syllabus Please circle the response that most closely resembles your views about the appropriateness of this section of the syllabus
25 x Completely appropriate 1 x Not Appropriate Comments:
From looking at samples of students’ work from some schools, it seems that there is a range of approaches here with some students given excessive (in my opinion) response to drafts, even drafts for tests (unseen).
Guideline is useless if not consistently applied by all schools.
I think this section is very explicit about expectations. Very helpful.
Agree with principle of increasing independence; however to suggest one draft in year 12 semester 3 especially when international students have returned after 6 weeks in their home country is not constructive.
Have not looked at new syllabus indepth as not using it (no year 11 cohort).
Links directly to Principle 4: Increasing independence
Highly appropriate for Principle 4.
I am glad that it is suggested and not mandated.
I am not sure about this. I make judgements on the individual students. Obviously some students improve to a level of independence where the drafting guidelines are
appropriate. For students at a lower level, I offer added consultation.
I think this is a fair guide for both students and teachers.
More evidence of increased independence and less teacher input. Verbal feedback, only in later part of year 12. Less task scaffolding and structuring. Multiple drafts not suitable and cloze style activities. Teachers should not be rewriting paragraphs and sentences. Too much evidence of heavy teacher input and corrections.
Draft work should be included in submissions to panels to allow for transparency in process.
Not appropriate – need to indicate how many drafts for a task for both year levels.
Completely appropriate – I believe 2 drafts in 11 and one in 12 does provide for the principle of increasing independence. We are, after all, preparing students (often) for the rigours of Uni or work. Giving any more than this does not allow for students own development and krashens (I + I) theory fits here. We have to constantly challenge all to go one step further to achieve.
3.2 Suggested instrument lengths for year 11 and 12 – 6.5.2 - Table 3 p29 of the syllabus Please circle the response that most closely resembles your views about the
appropriateness of this section of the syllabus
29 x Completely appropriate 0 x Not Appropriate Comments:
Very clear. It is helpful to have a variety of options for the length of time of an oral task.
You can design tasks which suit the cohort more effectively.
Increase or decrease in length helped students as they became more confident in their abilities but also to be concise when required.
Lengths suggested are appropriate for each year level.
Keep the same – very appropriate – length is fine for the levels 11 and 12.
No problems with this.
With the exception of pair or group spoken/signed which I believe is too short.
Yes, a good guide I think.
Lengths are suitable but could also be aligned with Senior English (2008) syllabus.
Do not make shorter if we want to be considered comparable and having academic rigour.
Somewhat appropriate – This works; however I believe all students should have a reflective text not persuasive ie persuasive should be optional and reflective mandatory.
Students can cover the persuasive text in the spoken instrument. Lengths are fine and along with increased complexity – increased length is appropriate. Suggestions of when to use long or short and spoken could be included.
Must be as for Board English to maintain standards and credibility.
3.3 Written requirements for verification folio – 6.6.1 on page 29 of the syllabus
Please circle the response that most closely resembles your views about the appropriateness of this section of the syllabus
28 x Completely appropriate 1 x Not Appropriate
Comments:
This section is fine but the issue of ‘authorship’ is difficult to monitor. Most students produce their own work as can be seen by the drafting process. However, there are cases where it is clear students have not completed the tasks themselves (independently) and even after exhausting all avenues, it is difficult to ‘prove’. This is also difficult to monitor in other subjects where native speakers have tutors.
It is quite prescribed but I really think that to maintain consistency and parity across all schools it needs to be; very clear; perhaps ‘a minimum of three written instruments’ rather than the ambiguous ‘three or four’.
The 6.6.1 information provides a detailed description of what is needed for verification;
however the word ‘must’ should be followed by either 3 OR 4 written instruments.
Written requirements should include mandatory imaginative and reflective tasks that assess all three criteria. More emphasis on ‘response to literature’ tasks and conditions for exam to show authentic student work (handwritten).
I’m not sure why these particular genre types are mandated but I think they are fine.
As discussed on day 1, it is difficult to find a task that does not require cognitive
processes. If this is the case, I believe all 3 criteria should be assessed in each instrument so the line ‘at least 2 instruments assessing all 3 criteria’ would be irrelevant – this would also be true for spoken/signed tasks.
If these pieces are spread over a period of time they reflect language development and conceptual/cognitive understanding/maturity in the individual student – or the opposite perhaps – a lack of focus/declining application! – a fair system. What about being specific about the number of pieces?
3.4 Spoken/signed requirements for verification folio – 6.6.2 p30 of the syllabus Please circle the response that most closely resembles your views about the appropriateness of this section of the syllabus
26 x Completely appropriate 3 x Not Appropriate Comments:
C2 – necessity for one piece to be analytical – response to literature. Is this too prescriptive?? I don’t think subject English is as prescriptive in this respect.
I am not sure why a spoken task must be presented in term 4.
Perhaps ‘a minimum of two spoken instruments’ rather than ambiguous ‘three or four’.
Clear conditions.
The same for this section – keep it clear about what is actually required for verification.
I’m not sure why these particular genre types are mandated but I think they are fine.
I like the fact that the student submitted as an A standard does not have to be from a submitted folio or whose overall achievement is not VHA.
Should the instruction be more specific ie two spoken instruments.
Should be three compulsory spoken tasks to allow students the opportunities to demonstrate all three criteria. This will allow students to achieve a ‘SA’ achievement overall, similar to Senior English (2008) trial syllabus.
Not appropriate. One should be persuasive.
3.5 Awarding exit levels of achievement – 6.8 - table on p32 of the syllabus Please circle the response that most closely resembles your views about the appropriateness of this section of the syllabus
28 x Completely appropriate 1 x Not Appropriate Comments:
Yes, I believe that a sound achievement in Communication Skills, Criterion 3, is necessary.
A student may not be able to write accurately but they can still communicate their intention in the genre required.
As English is a second language ‘Communication Skills’ should deserve to be seen as the most important and therefore essential for a passing grade.
C = any two criteria and no less than a D in the remaining criterion; All criteria should be equally weighted; Don’t agree with students need to pass Cr3 to pass.
Clear for assessment/awarding exit levels of achievement. The criterion needs to be clear as to which one is more heavily weighted ie C3.
I would reword the LA standard to include more detail.
I think it is fair – but at this conference, we collectively raised the question of the extra emphasis on Communication Skills – this is mainly to do with register, tenor etc – so I think the requirement is relevant.
Awarding exit levels should be weighted upon all three criteria and an on-balance judgement of written and spoken responses.
VLA – must be E in three – should say 2 criteria?
3.6 Standards associated with exit criteria – 6.8.1 – p33
Please circle the response that most closely resembles your views about the appropriateness of this section of the syllabus
24 x Completely appropriate 4 x Not Appropriate Comments:
Points raised at yesterday’s session need to be considered eg Crit 1 – ‘range of spelling’;
grammar – especially D and E; separating verbal and non-verbal descriptors.
Not appropriate – Point 1, as discussed in Thursday discussion too broad – needs specific written and spoken dot points.
Still lack of descriptors for spoken/signed tasks – will this be amended?
Partly – be more specific with spoken components to be assessed (ie gestures, pace, volume, expression, pronunciation, fluency, clarity).
Appropriate but only once the necessary changes, according to teachers’ feedback have been made. These standards are better to work with than those of previous syllabus.
As discussed on Day 1 – many inconsistencies and lack of differentiation between grades.
Needs to be re-worked.
Could make it even a little more prescribed for further clarity – C1, C2, C3.
Perhaps clarity is needed of each criterion and the descriptors – to avoid confusion – should be equally weighted.
But there are some issues with wording.
Completely appropriate – matches with the objectives of the syllabus.
Completely appropriate – BUT spoken and non-verbal features etc could be included as separate points under the appropriate criteria (although we could do this ourselves for each specific task).
Verbal features need to be explicit on exit criteria and have stems for – spoken, non- verbal, visual/auditory; fix E2 to ‘basic sentence structures with limited grammatical accuracy’; Standard 5 needs to be divided into paragraphing and punctuation/spelling.
Criterion three – needs more unpacking in ‘LA’ and ‘VLA’ standard descriptors (flesh out).
The standards for spoken tasks requires the addition of non-verbals (pause, pitch, pace, eye contact, gestures, etc). Criteria two – cognitive processes are NOT just in response to other texts but should be evident in the construction of their own texts.
Spoken/non-verbal/visual/auditory features – incorporated into the criteria – specific for students
Knowledge about language. Apart from the grammatical and/or spelling oversights discussed at conference, I believe this criterion to be mostly appropriate. I think the first dot point could be split so as not to assess so many aspects within one descriptor.
Cognitive processes – Mostly appropriate. Some tasks do not allow for analysis or synthesis from a wide variety of texts.
Communication skills – Mostly appropriate. If communication skills carries a different weight to the other criteria, it should possibly have more detail.
I believe a model and or definition of examples indicating ‘discerning’ or ‘sustained’, for example, be given. Many teacher see this vocab as hard to distinguish between. This is true across all 3 criteria when differentiating between A and B descriptors.